rtheast of the town with a huge army.
In a heavy fog, about daybreak, Clive came up at the head of a mixed
force of king's troops, sepoys and sailors, some two thousand men in all.
Hordes of Persian cavalry charged him through the mist, but they were
beaten off, and Clive forced his way through the enemy's camp until he
came near the Nawab's own tents, pitched in Omichand's garden.
Sirajuddaula himself was within an ace of being captured. His troops made
but a poor stand against the British, and by midday the battle was over.

Scared by this defeat, the Nawab was ready to conclude with the Company
the treaty which long negotiations had failed to effect. By this treaty
the trading privileges granted to the Company by the emperor of Delhi
were confirmed; the Nawab agreed to pay full compensation for the losses
sustained by the Company and its servants; and the right to fortify
Calcutta was conceded. The longstanding grievances of the Company were
thus, on paper, redressed.

A day or two after the battle a ship arrived with the news that war had
been declared in Europe between England and France. Efforts to maintain
neutrality between the English and French in Bengal having failed, Clive
wished the Nawab to join him in an attack on the French settlements in
Bengal. This the Nawab refused to do, though he wrote, promising that he
would hold as enemies all who were enemies of Clive--a promise that bore
bitter fruit before many months had passed.

The French were keen rivals of the Company in the trade of India, and
constantly took advantage of native troubles to score a point in the
game. Clive had come to Bengal with the full intention of making the
Company, whose servant he was, supreme; and having secured the treaty
with Sirajuddaula he resolved to turn his arms against the French. They
were suspected of helping the Nawab in his expedition against Calcutta:
it was known that the Nawab, treating his engagements with reckless
levity and faithlessness, was trying to persuade Bussy, the French
commander in the Dekkan, to help him to expel the British from Bengal.
There was excuse enough for an attack on Chandernagore.

But before Clive could open hostilities, he was required, by an old
arrangement with the Mogul, to obtain permission from the Nawab. This
permission was at length got from him by Omichand. The sack of Calcutta
by the Nawab had caused Omichand great loss, and, hoping in part to
retrieve it, he made his